The goal of this conference is to bring together scientists and trainees from around the world to present and discuss cutting-edge research in the field of cardiac metabolism. The heart must readily adjust to changes in energy supply/demand, and the most highly prevalent cardiac pathologies such as heart failure, myocardial ischemia, and diabetic cardiomyopathy, all have an underlying metabolic component that is directly involved in disease progression. Understanding the molecular underpinnings of impaired heart metabolism is crucial to restoring appropriate function and developing therapies for cardiovascular disease. Following significant technological advances, the time is optimal for broad implementation of cutting-edge techniques to further our understanding of cardiac metabolism in health and disease. However, despite the increasing availability of approaches including genomics, epigenomics, metabolomics, proteomics, and integration of these types of datasets, their successful implementation often remains elusive to those lacking expertise in their use. It is widely acknowledged that, while ?big data? sets are straightforward to generate, taking a project from an excel spreadsheet to meaningful biological conclusions presents significant barriers. Therefore, research resources are not used to their fullest potential. Moreover, some scientists /trainees feel intimidated by this emerging and rapidly developing area. To address these issues, the goal of this conference is to provide a forum in which scientists that have successfully utilized ?-omics? approaches in rigorous manners can discuss recent research studies that have resulted in meaningful outcomes relevant to the field of cardiovascular metabolism. This will be the thrust of the 16th Annual Meeting of the Society for Heart and Vascular Metabolism (SHVM), entitled ?Using unbiased discovery approaches for identifying novel mechanisms modulating cardiovascular metabolism?, which will take place on September 30-October 3, 2018, in Charleston, South Carolina. SHVM meetings have historically relied on heavy participation from trainees (PhD students and postdoctoral fellows). Continuing with this theme, the 2018 meeting will include a trainee workshop directed by three top experts in analysis of large ?omics? data sets; this workshop is entitled ?Systems Approaches to Biological Discovery: from experimental design to data analysis and beyond?. The meeting format will facilitate interaction between trainees with junior and established investigators, featuring 16 invited speakers and 9 short talks (selected from submitted abstracts), with representation from early stage investigators, women, and underrepresented minorities. Here, we request funds to offset costs associated with toward trainee and keynote speaker participation, as well as renting of poster boards. SHVM meetings are considered the premiere meeting in cardiac metabolism, and have an establish track record for fostering productive collaborations and advances. The 2018 meeting holds the promise of continuing this tradition.